Poll of marginals bad news for Labor

Updated
January 29, 2013 08:41:00

An opinion poll, published this morning in the Fairfax, shows Labor is set to lose 18 seats and government at this year's election.The polling of the country's 54 most marginal seats shows an almost 5 per cent swing against the government. More than 3000 people took part, the margin of error was less than 2 per cent. The survey was conducted nearly a fortnight ago by JWS Research, its managing director of research John Scales

TONY EASTLEY: The Labor national executive might also pore over the results of an opinion poll, published this morning in the Fairfax newspapers, showing that Labor's set to lose 18 seats and government at this year's election.

Both the Prime Minister and leader of the Opposition are gearing up to deliver speeches at the National Press Club during the next couple of days where they will outline their strategies for this election year.

The polling of the country's 54 most marginal seats shows an almost 5 per cent swing against the government. More than 3,000 people took part and the margin of error was less than 2 per cent.

The survey was conducted nearly a fortnight ago by JWS Research, its managing director of research John Scales has been speaking with chief political correspondent Sabra Lane.

JOHN SCALES: We did a poll of the 54 most marginal seats in Australia, those in the bandwidth of plus/minus 6 per cent to lose, that included 29 Coalition seats and 25 Labor seats, and we think that's the best seats to look at that will determine the result of the next election.

SABRA LANE: And what did your polling show?

JOHN SCALES: Overall, there is a swing against Labor since the last election by nearly 5 per cent, minus 4.8, and that shows them losing a net loss of minus 18 seats at the next election.

SABRA LANE: And how many voters all up did you talk to?

JOHN SCALES: We polled 3,350 people across all of those seats, about the same number of people in each of those 54 seats.

SABRA LANE: Is there any state where Labor would pick up seats?

JOHN SCALES: So in Queensland, they stand to pick up seats, up to six seats. That's because at the last election the Coalition won a lot of seats in Queensland, so there are a lot of marginal Coalition seats in Queensland.

So potentially they pick up seats there with a swing to them in Queensland of plus 2.8 and I'd say there's probably some state-based factors coming into play there as well.

And to balance that, in New South Wales in Sydney there are a lot of Labor marginals, Labor hung onto a lot of seats in Sydney at the last election so there's a lot of narrow marginals in New South Wales.

So with a double digit minus 12 per cent swing there, they stand to lose up to 10 seats.

SABRA LANE: And you just talked about some local factors in Queensland, so you're pointing to Cambell Newman, the cuts there, and also New South Wales presumably, the incidents that are playing out before ICAC at the moment, would that be affecting the vote?

JOHN SCALES: They're the two big issues that would appear to be playing out and would appear to be affecting the vote, because the swings in Queensland, New South Wales are so different from the other states, the other states are much within the range of the overall minus 5 per cent swing.

SABRA LANE: No-one's exactly sure on when the election will be called but it could be somewhere between August and the end of October. Can Labor turn around those figures in that amount of time?

JOHN SCALES: Well it would be a big recovery from here. The election is expected to be in the second half of the year and on these figures there's no reason why you'd call an early election when you're looking at a loss of up to 18 seats on a 5 per cent swing.

But you never rule anything out in politics.

SABRA LANE: Is there a comparable result in recent electoral history that would equate to that 18 seat loss?

JOHN SCALES: In terms of coming back from that far behind, Howard did it back in 2001, came from just as far behind to win the election. I think the electorate is a bit more ready to change government these days than what it has been in the past.

So if people don't think the government deserves to be there, they will vote against them regardless of the traditional holder of the seat, as it were, so and on that basis voters are saying they're not very happy because only 25 per cent of voters are saying that they think the Gillard Government's doing a good job, that's the key here.

TONY EASTLEY: John Scales from JWS Research, speaking there with Sabra Lane.